


Satellite Mind

by eponymous_rose



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-12
Updated: 2014-08-12
Packaged: 2018-02-12 21:20:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2125068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eponymous_rose/pseuds/eponymous_rose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So, look, there are things about integrating with an artificial intelligence that they don’t put in the handbooks or teach in the classroom. It’s all about finding a middle ground.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Satellite Mind

As it turns out, having an artificial intelligence sharing your brainspace isn't really something you ever get to turn off. The first time York pulls Delta, it's a mutually agreed-upon experiment. Just to make sure there won't be any lasting side-effects. It's all very, you know. Logical.

After he pulls Delta, York sits on his bunk for half an hour, just trying to reassure himself that he doesn't feel any different. His brain is kinda weird and echo-y, so he strolls over to the mess, catches Connie and South and North and Wash in the middle of a heated discussion about weapon maintenance and a heated discussion about cafeteria food and a heated discussion about pretty much everything they lay their eyes on. That crowd's not exactly big on lukewarm discussions.

But York catches himself making a few too many pedantic comments, fixating on minute details, picking away at tiny discrepancies that really have no bearing on the conversation but they're  _missing the point_ and he can't help himself. Basically, he starts pissing everyone off without meaning to, which is infinitely less fun than doing it on purpose. He becomes aware of this flaw in the conversation because of his stunning gift of self-awareness and also maybe the fact that eventually even North gets fed up and tells him he's being an obnoxious prick.

York retreats to his room, brings Delta back online. "Okay," he says. "So that could've gone better."

Delta flashes into holographic life, tilts his head. "You can't blame me for all your social missteps, York."

York flops back on his bunk, rubbing at the still-healing scar under his left eye, testing the transition from numbed scar tissue to raw nerves. "I can try, D. I can try."

Delta pauses. "They did warn us that integration would likely result in small shifts in each of our personalities as we swing toward a middle ground. These oscillations should subside over time."

"You saying that because you know, or you just guessing?"

Another pause. Hint of a smile. "I am guessing, York. That may be your influence at work."

"Right," York says, grinning up at the ceiling. "Middle ground."

* * *

See, here's the thing: there's a reason he kind of wants to get used to pulling Delta, and that reason is that York is kind of, you know. Not that much of an exhibitionist. Sexually speaking. Like, maybe under very specific controlled circumstances that don't involve the computer in his head sitting back and making clinical observations the whole time...

It isn't much of a problem, at first. Between the painkillers and the pain and the heaping spoonful of weird, York doesn't have a whole lot of, y'know,  _drive_. But Carolina grins at him, once, across the table—she doesn't smile like that these days, not often—and that grin comes back to him when he's tangled in his sheets at night, and by the time he blunders back to consciousness, he's already rolling onto his back, kicking off the sheets, sleepily reaching down to palm his half-hard cock through his boxers

And then he freezes. It's like he's a teenager again, waking up unbearably horny on the floor during some family camp-out but coming to the sudden and disconcerting realization that he's not alone in the room and that jerking off while half-asleep may just come back to bite him in the ass. (And not in the fun way, either.)

Delta's not projecting a hologram. York can feel his presence as a weight in his mind, a held-breath of anticipation. York holds his own breath, watches his cock go from half-mast to no-mast to folded-up-in-a-drawer-somewhere-never-to-be-used-again.

"York," Delta says, and York gives a nervous, high-pitched laugh. Okay, so maybe York giggles.

"Sorry," he says. "This is weird. This is... too weird."

To his relief, Delta seems just as uncomfortable. "The Director did not provide instruction in this particular matter."

"Oh god," York says.

"By which I mean," Delta says, quickly, "he didn't mention how the integration might affect the Agent's urge for and means of... release."

" _Oh god_."

"Of course, given my observations of the other implanted agents, I believe you may be the one with the highest sex drive under normal circumstances... York, you are hyperventilating."

"Nah, I'm fine, D, I just..." The nervous, terrified amusement fades out so suddenly it startles even him, leaving a weird sort of frustrated rage in its place. He balls up a fist, punches the edge of the mattress beside him. "This is kind of fucked up sometimes, you know? The Director didn't exactly think this whole thing through, despite all the endless psych profiles. Or maybe he did and this is all part of the fuckin' experiment."

"You could pull me again," Delta says.

"It's fine," York says. Takes a deep breath. "It's okay, D, I'm fine. We'll work around it. I don't want to talk about it anymore, okay?"

A pause. "If you and Agent Carolina resume your sexual relationship—"

York holds up his hands. " _Delta_. C'mon, man. Just let me get some sleep. We'll figure this out in the morning."

Delta backs off, almost palpably, and York sighs, settling himself on his side and wedging one arm under his head.

Just as York's breathing has slowed, just as he's tumbling through incoherent thoughts on the very edge of sleep, Delta says, with a distinct smirk in his voice, "I believe the operative phrase here is 'sweet dreams'."

"Snarky little cockbite," York mutters, and buries his smile in his pillow.

* * *

Carolina's kept her distance since York's accident, since Maine got hurt. Since Tex. Since everything about Tex.

But there is, inevitably, a late-night training session. There's him and there's her and there's a shitload of adrenaline and just the right level of pain to make them both linger in the locker room a little longer than they might've, otherwise.

"You're overcompensating," Carolina says, breaking the oppressive silence. She's been dragging a brush through her hair for the past five minutes with a sort of determined frustration.

"What?" York says, perfectly calmly and not at all in a squeaky voice, because okay, he's only wearing a towel around his waist at this point, making a big show of icing his shoulder, and there are certain words you don't want to hear when you're mostly divested of your clothing.

"In your attacks," Carolina says. ("Oh. Right. That.") "You're broadcasting your hits from the right side. Probably overthinking the part that Delta's helping you with. You've got to trust him, York."

"Aw, you'll give him a complex. He's already insufferable."

"I'm being serious."

"So am I. He acts all calm and logical and whatever, but he's really a cocky little shit." York grins as Delta's amusement runs through his neural pathways; their integration's always deepest during combat. "Right, D?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about, York."

To York's surprise, Carolina snorts at that, her lips turning up in real amusement. She stops power-brushing her hair, stares at it critically in the mirror for a second, then sighs and drags fingers back through it. She's wearing civvies, a light blue shirt and black sweatpants that are, possibly, just a little lower-cut and just a little tighter, respectively, than her usual attire. York realizes, belatedly, that her hair is down, and his brain kind of short-circuits for a second.

She half-turns, and there's a really, really dark look in her eyes, anticipation and frustration and eagerness and, fuck.  _Fuck_.

"Hey," she says. "Delta?"

"Signing off," Delta says, the little coward, and York feels him vanish from his brainspace.

A second later, Carolina pins York up against his locker. He maybe sorta drops the towel.

She's got both hands looped around the back of his neck so she can bring the full strength of her forearms against his shoulders, effectively pinning his arms at his sides. His bruised shoulder protests in the best possible way. Her knee's pressed insistently between his legs, and she's grinding up against his thigh, and he groans so loud against her lips that he's pretty sure everyone on the fucking ship must have heard it. She catches his lower lip between her teeth, sucks on it long enough that he wonders if he's gonna have to come up with an explanation for bruised and swollen lips at the breakfast table tomorrow. He wonders if he's gonna have some more interesting bruises to explain. He thinks he's pretty okay with that.

It's all great, the feeling of her shirt rubbing against his bare nipples every time she rolls her hips against him, the sweet shampoo-smell of her hair, the little puffs of her gasps against his mouth as she gets more and more into her rhythm, rubbing herself off against his thigh so he can feel the heat and wetness even through her sweatpants. It's all great.

He's just not, um. He can't. Um.

Carolina catches on quick, stops instantly, pulls back. "Hey," she says. "You okay?"

She's relaxed her grip enough for him to free his arms and reach around to grab her ass, to pull her up along the length of his thigh in a motion that makes her shudder, but she's not distracted. Instead, she places a hand on his chest and puts a teasing lilt into her voice. "York. I know you. By now you're usually staring off into space thinking of god-knows-what so you don't come all over yourself during the dry-humping part of the program." She presses her knee against his balls, gently, and York winces. Yup. Still no signs of life down south. "I repeat: you okay?"

"Wow. I can't help feeling that was a dig at my stamina," he says, to cover the more cliché responses bubbling up in his brain.  _I swear this never happens to me. I mean, it happens to a lot of guys..._

"Pain meds?" she says, and gently disentangles herself from his hands, moving a step away. Keeping her distance. "Or is it something else?" She frowns and puts on her Super-Team-Leader voice. And not in the fun way. "York, you can talk to me if something's wrong. If I overstepped—"

"What? No! No, no overstepping. Just the right amount of stepping, and grinding, and um." York tangles his fingers back in his hair. Then, in a moment of clarity that feels disconcertingly like Delta pointing out something obvious coming up on his left, he wonders why the hell he's playing coy. He's been trying to get Carolina to talk to him, to really  _talk_  to him, for weeks. "Honestly? Sex has been... weird, with the A.I. and all."

"Oh," Carolina says, like she's just put the final piece of a puzzle together. "Right. That would be... yeah."

"Yeah," York says, and they stand in silence for a second. "We don't have to stop. I mean, you're right. Half the time I'm done in the first two minutes anyway and, uh. I honestly don't care that much about getting off. Not as much as I care about getting you off."

She smirks, and he's pretty sure her cheeks flush red for a second. "That's one hell of a pickup line."

"Pickup lines are important," he says, affronted. "Also has the benefit of being completely true, so. You know. I'm still game if you are."

She rolls her eyes, but when he reaches out hesitantly, tracing his fingers along the waistband of her pants, she takes his hand in hers, guides it down between her legs, and moves in for a rougher kiss.

* * *

When he stumbles back to bed, belatedly reactivating Delta, everything's okay. Like, he may have just stayed completely soft through some of the best sex of his life, but Carolina's unquestionably more relaxed now than she was at the start of the night. She's more relaxed three or four times over.

He grins at the ceiling, interlocking his hands behind his head. Okay. So there's a little self-interest at play, here. 'Cause now, whenever he does get back on his feet again, he's got, like, a solid year of jerkoff fodder burned into his brain. The way she bucked and gasped and clenched around his fingers. The way she shoved him up against the lockers, face first this time, and pressed a spit-slick finger into him, knuckle-deep, mumbling her frustration into his shoulder. The way she tasted when she rode out her second orgasm with her fingers tangled tight in his hair.

Delta is hovering, unobtrusive, and he's definitely deep enough in the neural link to be remembering this stuff right along with York, but honestly, York's too tired and happy to care. And Delta is... Delta is a part of York now, right? Something like that.

"Something like that," Delta agrees.

"Middle ground," York says, with a solemn and not at all sleep-deprived certainty in the depth and genius of that statement.

"You need to be awake at 0500, York. You have less than four hours to sleep."

"Thanks, D. Can always count on you to ruin the mood."

"I am here to assist."

* * *

Carolina catches him twice more that week. He's bright enough to clue into the fact that she's looking at this latest hiccup as a capital-C Challenge. Something to be overcome with enough training and hard work and perseverance.

He's pretty okay with that. It doesn't work, but the training and hard work and perseverance is half the fun.

The third time, she comes to his room early enough that there are still people out roaming the corridors. Her lip is split from an earlier training match—more like an all-out brawl—in which Wyoming actually managed to knock off her helmet. Wyoming's been resting comfortably in the infirmary ever since.

She's also breathing hard already, and he's pretty sure it's not arousal that has her clenching her jaw and squaring her shoulders. Sometimes Carolina fucks like she fights.

She locks the door behind her; he dims the lights and grins at her until she snarls and shoves him back onto the bunk with so much force that he bounces against the hard mattress. She straddles him, then reaches down to grab the silk ropes he'd picked up last time they'd had short leave. He squirms under her, yanking off his shirt and shimmying out of his jeans while still trying to keep an eye on the way her hands are working. You know, for future reference. She's very, very good with knots.

"Don't pull Delta," she says, startling him into noticing that Delta's still quietly observing. He's usually taken himself offline by now. If it weren't for the fact that Delta kinda, y'know, lives in his head, York would suspect collusion. _  
_

"Uh," says York, and then, for good measure, "Um."

She rests a hand on his chest. "It's okay, York. I'm okay with it if you are. I really think this might help."

Delta slips slowly, hesitantly, into a deeper neural link; he feels Delta's presence as a sort of clinical curiosity, an awareness of his body as though from the outside. His nerves light up the way they do in battle, hypersensitive. He's very aware of the weight of Carolina's body on his stomach. "York," Carolina says again. "You gotta say it."

"I'm okay with it," he repeats, softly, and the wash of relief from Delta courses through him, making him shiver.

She straightens up. Delta observes that York is presently spread-eagled beneath her on the bed and wearing a grand total of one sock; York grins, a little nervously. Carolina finally smiles crookedly around the gash in her lip. "Hey," she says, and reaches down to wrap her callused fingers around his cock. "Let's give this another try."

"I'm not gonna argue with that," he says, testing the strength of his bonds until he's satisfied with the burn in his shoulders. She watches him, and he wonders if she's entirely conscious of the way she's chewing on her lower lip. Instinctively, he stretches toward her for a kiss but comes up short. She grins, a flash of teeth in the faint light. Yeah, okay. She knows.

She pulls her hand away from his limp cock, shifts to reach under the bed again. Comes up with a half-used bottle of lube. His breath catches at that goddamn smirk, and Delta draws attention to the way his hips twitch in response.

She goes straight for the target again, clenching a slick fist around his cock and tugging once, twice. He's bucking his hips instinctively, but it's like there's something numbed there, some local anesthetic. Maybe there's a fucking anesthetic in his  _brain_ , because he's tied to the bed while Carolina concentrates on the way she's pumping his cock in her hand, and now her other hand is tracing back between his ass cheeks, fingers cold with lube—

He yelps, bucking, when she presses two fingers in without warning; the past few days have stretched him out a little, but she's not trying to be gentle tonight. She pulls them out, shoves them deeper, and he whimpers, squirming, panting, completely at her mercy, because, yeah. Sometimes she fucks like she fights.

But the cock she's tugging more and more determinedly is still limp. Still nothing. Fucking nothing. And the big part of York that's been determinedly cheerful through this whole thing starts crumbling into something that feels a lot like anger. Delta retreats, hovering at the very edge of his consciousness.

Carolina must catch the frustration in his eyes, because she proceeds to fuck him. Definitively. She licks and tugs and rubs and sucks. She even, at his request, slaps him, until the too-loud sound starts making them both nervous about the passers-by outside his room and they collapse into nervous snickering. She pulls off her clothes, slides the warmth and wetness of her cunt along the flaccid length of his cock, bringing herself off on top of him. Delta logs the expression on her face when she comes, staring down at him with a determined frustration, silent except for the little hitch in her breathing.

Still nothing.

His shoulders, especially the still-bruised one, are aching by the time Carolina finally sighs and sprawls against his chest, one hand still lazily pulling on his cock, which would be practically chafed raw at this point if not for her methodical reapplication of lube. She's got her chin on his shoulder, and he knows without looking that she's got the dazed, tired look in her eyes that means she's a million miles away, probably working out the duty rosters for next week or worrying about the damn leaderboard again. The cut on her lip has reopened, and Delta is fascinated by the way she keeps licking away the blood, distractedly.

Her hand on York's cock has fallen into a languid, even rhythm. He drifts, eyes half-lidded. Thinks about that rhythm, about the precise amount of time between each stroke, the instant of anticipation before the next long, slow pull of her fingers. Wonders at how perfectly she can tell time, how carefully and methodically similar each tug is to the last. To the next.

He groans. His hips twitch.

Carolina jolts above him. "Hel _lo_ ," she says, grinning, and he cranes his neck to watch her proudly nudge, with her fingertips, what is definitely on its way to becoming an erection. He's never been so fucking relieved to see a half-chub in his life.

Delta, in response, sinks deep into York's nervous system, and he sucks in a breath. "Keep it slow," he says. "As even as you can."

She blinks at him, but repositions so she's huddled on the bed beside him and starts tugging again, slightly faster this time but with no less attention paid to the time between pulls. The little mental clock Delta keeps running in his head for lockpicking gives him a pretty accurate estimate of the frequency of her handjob. He figures she's keeping each stroke consistent to within a quarter-second, which is pretty fucking impressive.

He's rock-hard in less than twenty seconds, straining against her hand, and she pauses with a smirk to smear pre-come across the tip of his cock. "Oh,  _fuck_ ," he says. The way he's craning his neck hurts like hell, but it's worth it to see the way his cock twitches in her hand. When she starts up again, the rhythm of her strokes is pounding in his ears. "It's been way, way, way too long," he says, or tries to say because his vocal cords seem a little more interested in moaning just now. Like, wantonly.

"Keep it down," Carolina hisses, but the irritation in her voice is a pretty lousy cover for her amusement. York's about to make a comment he's pretty sure he'll regret about a ball gag, but just then Carolina speeds up the rhythm of her hand.

Delta informs him that it's precisely twice the frequency of her earlier strokes.

York thrusts helplessly into her hand, shuddering, throwing off her rhythm, but he's good, now, he's good, he's taking in the little wet sounds of his cock in her slick hand, he's whimpering and moaning and cursing and kicking out, he's driving his legs deeper into the mattress, and she's resting a hand on his forehead, dragging it back against his hair, and her other hand's abandoned all pretense of a slow fuck, tugging roughly, harshly—

He comes into her hand, onto his stomach, so hard and so long he nearly blacks out, but she doesn't falter, keeps pulling him and pulling him through it until he's just shaking, the aches in his shoulders starting to fade in through the high, staring down in some wonder at the smears of white on his stomach.

"Well," Carolina says, reaching over for a tissue to wipe up the mess. "That looked fun. You should see your face when you do that, York. It's really something."

Delta draws his attention to the fact that she's still wearing nothing but a shit-eating grin, draws his attention to the reflected gleam of wetness between her thighs. There's a little residual twitch from his cock, but he's pretty sure he's not gonna be able to press his luck for a round two tonight. Still. He waggles his eyebrows, making an effort to drag his breathing back under control. "Untie me and I'll return the favor."

"Hey, now. Why would I do that when I've got you right where I want you?" She moves up to the head of the bunk with a certain awkward grace, given the smallness of the mattress. He strains against his bonds with the urge to reach out and roll a nipple to hardness under his palm, to plunge fingers deep inside her, to drag his thumb against her clit and watch her come apart.

Instead, she positions herself above his face, and he grins, giddy with the familiarity of it, with the dazed haze of pleasure and the taste of her on his lips, the slow rocking of her hips as he presses his tongue inside her, the little gasps she makes as he drags that tongue in slow circles around her clit. She comes fast, bucks once against his mouth, belies the silence of her orgasm by slamming forward, catching herself against the wall on her forearms with a bang that echoes around the small room.

"So much for keeping quiet," he says, when his mouth's no longer otherwise occupied. He loves this part, afterwards, the taste in his mouth, the wetness on his chin. She's finally untied him, sprawled on top of him in bed with her knee pressed between his legs, her face pressed into his shoulder. He's tracing one finger up and down her spine, idly. Delta's somewhere in his backbrain just, you know. Observing.

"You started it," she murmurs.

At the back of his mind, Delta notes that she does have a point. York shakes his head to clear it. "Okay, I'll give you that one."

They're quiet a little while longer, each loathe to bring up the necessity of a quick scrub-up and her long walk back to her quarters. Then she says, in a stiff voice that's nervous in its sincerity, "I'm glad you're okay, York."

And for a second, just a second, his breath freezes in his chest, because he's thinking about how important, how absolutely  _essential_  the perfect rhythm of her hand was. He's thinking about logic and precision. He's thinking about Delta. He's thinking about middle ground.

"Yeah," he says. He pictures the neural implants lighting up in his brain. "Yeah. I'm always okay."


End file.
